The Mythology of Rape Exceptions: An excerpt from the book Coercion
by Kylie Cheung
Throughout my years writing about reproductive justice, survivor justice, and the inextricability of these movements and experiences, I’ve encountered a similar pattern: Just as we’re told, implicitly and explicitly, there are “good” victims and “bad” victims, we’re similarly told there are “good” abortions and “bad” abortions.
Despite these innately sexist, surface-level distinctions, under patriarchy, rape culture, and abortion bans, all survivors and all abortion seekers are dehumanized and denied agency—by abusive men, and certainly, by the state governments that are imposing forced pregnancy. In some narrow cases, their laws claim to offer exceptions to rape victims, deeming these abortions “good.”
Kylie Cheung writes: In my new book, one section addresses the mythology of rape exceptions, the anti-abortion movement’s attempts to distinguish “good” abortions from “bad,” and why these exceptions don’t work. I argue that anti-abortion leaders know these exceptions don’t work—they simply want the good PR of pretending to care about victims, while, in reality, ensuring that no one can actually get care, because doctors are too afraid of prison time to provide it.
Publisher Pluto Press adds: Since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022, the horrors inflicted by abortion bans began immediately and haven’t stopped. These laws have become a tool for abusers, as pregnant people face legal harassment, reproductive coercion, and life-threatening medical trauma. Through biting analysis, Kylie Cheung argues that these aren’t unintended consequences, but deliberate acts of state-perpetrated violence inflicted on women and pregnant people, particularly those with the least resources and agency under capitalism and white supremacy. Capitalism has always consciously decided whose lives are expendable. This book is for everyone coming to terms with this fact in the era of the rollback of our bodily autonomy.
SOURCE: Pluto Press, 2025.
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Republicans wanted fewer abortions and more births. They are getting the opposite
The rate of voluntary sterilization among young women jumped abruptly after Dobbs, and there’s no reason to believe it will drop off
Dobbs v Jackson Women’s Health Organization, the US Supreme Court case that rescinded the constitutional right to abortion, is failing on its own terms. Since the ruling, in June 2022, the number of abortions in the US has risen. Support for reproductive rights is on the upswing. And the rate of voluntary sterilization among young women – a repudiation of Trumpian pronatalism, if a desperate one – jumped abruptly after Dobbs, and there’s no reason to believe it will drop off.
Also rising at an alarming clip are preventable maternal deaths and criminal prosecutions of pregnant people.
SOURCE: The Guardian, 17 July 2025.
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Travel time, costs for abortions increased after state bans, researchers find
The Dobbs ruling ‘slowed people down, but it hasn’t decreased their determination to get that care.’ Travel costs for abortions and delays in care have increased in the wake of state abortion bans, according to a new study published in the American Journal of Public Health. Researchers from the University of California, San Francisco, surveyed more than 800 people across 14 states that implemented bans on abortion after the US Supreme Court’s June 2022 decision that dismantled the constitutional right to abortion.
SOURCE: Stateline.org, by Anna Claire Vollers, 16 July 2025.
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How Planned Parenthood’s Caren Spruch works with Lena Dunham and other creatives to sensitively portray abortion on screen
If you still remember the loud snap of Adam whipping off a condom after having sex with Hannah in the second episode of “Girls” — followed by a full episode of Hannah repeating that she always uses condoms but is nonetheless terrified that she’ll die of AIDS — you have Caren Spruch to thank for that. Spruch is the national director of arts and entertainment at Planned Parenthood. Her job is to help screenwriters and directors create accurate and sensitive on-screen representations of abortion and other reproductive health issues, in addition to galvanizing prominent industry figures to publicly endorse Planned Parenthood and its goals.
SOURCE: Variety, by Selome Hailu, 17 July 2025.
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Idaho agrees not to prosecute doctors for out-of-state abortion referrals
Idaho, which has a near-total ban on abortion, agreed not to prosecute or take away licenses of doctors who refer patients out of state to obtain the procedure, under a consent decree approved by a federal judge on Thursday. The decree prevents Idaho’s Republican Attorney General Raul Labrador and county prosecutors from prosecuting healthcare providers who refer, counsel or otherwise provide information to patients seeking abortions in other states.
SOURCE: Reuters, by Jonathan Stempel, 17 July 2025.